Perhaps it is Time to Die?
by HeavyMetal-Chic
Summary: A young girl is jilted by the guy she loves, who was simply pretending so that he could have fun with her. Her pain and rage leads her to decide to access the Hell Correspondence, seeking revenge.


Perhaps it is Time to Die?

Disclaimer: I do not own Hell Girl (Jigoku Shoujo) and I do not make any money off of this story. This story, like all of my other fan fiction stories, has been written purely for writing practice and for entertainment purposes.

A/N: In order to get back into the habit of writing regularly I'm trying to write some one-shots. These stories will also act as show casing my writing/beta-reading abilities. I Beta all of my own work. I'm also going to take a moment to point out that some of the dialogue in this story comes straight from the episode of Hell Girl: Two Mirrors titled Beloved Kei. It's the third episode of the second season.

Rating: M

Warnings: As this is a Hell Girl one-shot someone will be sent to hell in this story.

~~~~~Chapter Begins~~~~~

_A wavering wraith of karmic retribution_

_on a wandering path of wretched fate._

_Thoroughly despised and fractured,_

_a set of two mirrors facing one another._

_Coming forth from the darkness where time intersects,_

_your grievance shall be avenged._

The small bedroom was dark aside from the brightly glowing computer monitor. Sitting at the computer was a girl of about sixteen. There were tears in her eyes despite the look of rage on her face. Her hands shook as she typed the words "Hell Correspondence" into the search engine and hit enter. She clicked on the first link and then spent several moments refreshing the page. As she watched the clock, silently counting the minutes until midnight, her mind wandered back to the entire reason for her attempting to access a website that she was sure would only turn out to be a rumor.

_"You didn't actually think I was in love with you? How stupid could you be?"_

_ "But you said-"_

_ "Of course I said I loved you. How else would I have gotten you to do those things? You really are as dumb as the guys said you were."_

_ "I am NOT dumb!"_

_ "Whatever. Look, it was fun but Yumiko's just so much hotter than you ever could be. Let's not forget that she's not shy about showing her body off. Now get lost Keiko."_

Keiko quickly wiped the fresh tears the memory had brought to her eyes away with one hand while she refreshed the page one last time as the clock in the bottom right corner of her computer screen changed from 11:59PM to 12:00AM. This time instead of the error page that had been up on her screen for the last couple minutes the screen went black and a flame appeared in the center of the screen, like a candle being lit. Then the words "Your grievance shall be avenged" appeared where the flame had been, with a blank field to write a name in and a send button beneath the field. Keiko's hands shook even more as she prepared to type the name of her former boyfriend into the field.

"Let's see how well you like cheating after this you lying jerk!"

As soon as she had finished typing the name Asou Jun she clicked send and then closed her browser down. Then Keiko stood up, stretched, and turned to cross the small room to lie down in her bed. Upon turning around she had to cover her own mouth to keep herself from screaming and waking her entire family. Standing between her and her bed was a young girl with long black hair and large red eyes. She was dressed in a black school uniform with a red tie. Keiko took a step back and the world around her changed dramatically. Instead of being in her room, she found herself on a hill nearly covered in red Lycoris overlooking a lake. The sun was setting, bathing everything in blood red light. The girl Keiko was facing was standing in front of a tree. Behind the girl, but still in front of the tree was an old man wearing a traditional yukata, a haori as a coat, and an old fashioned fedora; all in varying shades of brown. The only colorful thing on the man was long red scarf. The man kept his head down so that Keiko couldn't really see his face passed the brim of his hat.

"My name is Ai. You have summoned me."

"Y-you are Hell Girl?"

The girl responded by nodding.

"If you enter into a covenant with me, the object of your vengeance will immediately be banished to hell. However, once you have your retribution, you will have to pay the price for it as well. Curses come home to roost. If you enter into the covenant, your soul will also go to Hell. That's only after you die, though."

Keiko blinked and bit her lip as she thought about what Hell Girl had just told her. She was so busy thinking everything through that she almost missed what happened next.

"Wanyudo."

"As you wish Miss."

Keiko blinked in shock as the man threw the left end of his scarf over his right shoulder and turned into a black straw doll that then appeared in Hell Girl's right hand. She held the doll out to Keiko, her face never changing expression and her voice never betraying any of her feelings.

"Here. If you really want retribution, simply untie the scarlet thread around his neck. By untying the thread, you will enter into the covenant with me. All that remains is for you to decide."

Keiko took the doll from Hell Girl and the next second she was back in her own room. She bit her lip as she stared at the scarlet thread that would eventually send her own soul to Hell should she choose to pull it. Finally she sighed and tucked the small doll into her school bag.

"I'll see what happens tomorrow and then decide what I want to do. Maybe he was just saying those things because some of his friends don't like me."

She sighed again and turned back to her bed. This time no one and nothing got in her way as she moved towards it and she was able to get into bed without any trouble. She curled into a ball on her bed and pulled her comforter up to her shoulders. It didn't take her long to fall asleep after that.

The next morning at school Keiko tried to pretend that everything was perfectly fine. The only problem was that the rumors about the scene between her and Jun had already started to spread around the school. Several of Yumiko's friends even stopped by Keiko's desk to mock her for having actually believed that one of the most attractive boys in the entire school would actually want her for anything but a little bit of fun. By lunch time Keiko was tempted to spend the rest of the day hiding on the roof of the school with some of the other less than popular students. After the morning she had experienced Keiko was sure that her day couldn't get any worse, unfortunately for her Yumiko knew exactly how to make her already horrible day even worse.

"I can't believe that you actually thought that any guy could want you more than they would want me. Jun in particular would never pick you over me. In fact, I'm shocked that you didn't realize that he and I were together before you started 'dating' him. Not that he actually wanted you as anything more than a passing bit of entertainment. I almost feel bad for you."

"Yumiko, Jun's been dating you all a long so why don't you stop gloating already. I'm miserable enough without you making it all worse."

Keiko stood up, grabbed her bag, and ran out of the room without a single glance back. She was out of breath by the time she got to the roof but at least she wouldn't really be bothered there. Surprisingly there weren't any other students on the roof, so she went to her normal spot and pulled the straw doll from her bag. She wiped tears from her eyes and sighed softly as she stared at the non-descript doll. Finally, after staring at it for several moments she nodded and took a deep breath before grabbing hold of one end of the thread. She slowly pulled it from around the doll's neck.

"Your grievance has been heard."

The doll flew from her hand and turned to dust that was blown away along with the thread. Keiko shivered and pulled her knees up to her chest before closing her eyes and hiding her face behind her knees. She didn't want to face her classmates again until after Jun was gone.

At the same time Jun was in the boy's bathroom. He was in the middle of washing his hands when a woman in a kimono walked into the room. She smiled at him as two girls in school uniforms and a guy he had never met entered the room.

"That's Jun, right?"

The kimono-clad woman smiled kindly to one of the girls and nodded.

"That's him, the one who thinks that he's good enough to please two girls."

"But he's so pathetic looking. Why would any girl date him?"

"With Ren around I know I wouldn't."

The two girls laughed and leaned against the guy as the woman in the kimono moved closer to Jun. She smiled at him.

"Girls, don't be too mean to him. I'm sure he's nice on the inside."

As she spoke the skin on half of her face became transparent, revealing the bones underneath. Jun screamed and backed quickly away from the woman. Only to run into Ren, who had vanished and reappeared behind him. Ren grabbed hold of Jun's arms roughly.

"You really shouldn't fool with the heart of a young woman; it only leads to pain and suffering on both your parts."

Suddenly the bathroom and the other people vanished, only to be replaced with a young girl in a black kimono adorned with sakura blossoms and multi-colored flowers. She was the only thing visible in the black void of nothingness now surrounding Jun. Her long black hair moved slightly as if blown by a slight wind and her large red eyes stared unblinking into Jun's eyes, as if looking directly into his very soul as she spoke.

"Oh pitiful shadow lost in the darkness, bringing torment and pain to others. Oh Damned soul, wallowing in your sin. Perhaps it is time to die."

She moved her right arm out so that her kimono sleeve hung straight without a single wrinkle and the bells on her black beaded bracelet rang loudly. As the bells rang, the petals of the sakura blossoms on her kimono flew off of it and surrounded Jun. He screamed loudly and passed out. When he came to he was in a boat. The young girl in the kimono stood at the back of the boat, guiding it towards a large shrine gate. Kneeling in front of her, facing Jun; was the kimono-clad woman from the restroom. Half of the skin on her face was gone, showing the bones beneath. She simply smiled at him as the young girl continued to guide the boat towards the gate. As they prepared to go through the gate the young girl finally spoke.

"This is vengeance; so I am to ferry you to hell."

A few weeks later, Keiko stood in the bathroom looking at herself in the mirror. Her long black hair was tied back in a high ponytail and she had just gotten her bangs to lie flat across her forehead. Her large brown eyes were the only thing that showed that all wasn't quite back to normal, there was still a lingering sadness in them though it was slowly going away. Her shirt wasn't buttoned all the way up yet and a black crest rested directly above her heart, a constant reminder that her soul would one day belong to Hell because of her choice to have Jun banished to Hell for his actions against her.

A candle is lit and joins hundreds of others, the name Kurosawa Keiko written in Kanji is etched into the waxy side of the candle.

_Your grievance shall be avenged._

~~~~~Chapter Ends~~~~~

A/N: For those of you who might have been a little bit puzzled because some of the dialogue seemed slightly off, the episode I modeled it off of (or took it directly from) was in Japanese so I used the subbed version verses the dubbed version. I did use some of the regular dialogue from the English version. The dialogue is never 100% exact from episode to episode anyways, but there is a lot of base dialogue that does not change. In English one such phrase used during that scene is "There always has to be a price". In the Japanese version of the series that is replaced with "Curses come home to roost". Either way the dialogue is still pretty cool. I hope you guys liked this one-shot. Depending on how I feel about the response to this story and what my boyfriend has to say about it, I may or may not extend this into a set of one-shots formatted a bit like the episodes of the show are.


End file.
